“[E]verybody who is incapable of learning has taken to teaching.”
Oscar Wilde book The Decay of Lying
Spoken by "Vivian."
The Decay of Lying (1889)
Quotes about learning page 5
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States
The New York Times (1960), as cited in The Beacon Book of Quotations by Women (1992) by Rosalie Maggio, p. 156
“Wonder is the beginning of wisdom in learning from books as well as from nature.”
Mortimer J. Adler (1902–2001) American philosopher and educator
Source: How to Read a Book: The Classic Bestselling Guide to Reading Books and Accessing Information
“One cannot learn from someone whom one distrusts.”
Idries Shah (1924–1996) writer and Sufi teacher
Source: Sufi Thought and Action
Galén (129–216) Roman physician, surgeon and philosopher
Galen, On the Natural Faculties, Bk. 1, sect. 13; cited from Arthur John Brock (trans.) On the Natural Faculties (London: Heinemann, 1963) p. 57.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875–1926) Austrian poet and writer
Source: Translations from the Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke
“We teach best what we most need to learn.”
Richard Bach (1936) American spiritual writer
Illusions : The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah (1977)
Variant: You teach best what you most need to learn.
Source: Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah
“He who learns but does not think is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.”
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States
Source: The Autobiography of Eleanor Roosevelt
“Always walk through life as if you have something new to learn, and you will.”
Vernon Howard (1918–1992) American writer
Louis Sachar (1954) American writer of children's books
Source: The Cardturner: A Novel about a King, a Queen, and a Joker
“In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn.”
Phil Collins (1951) English musician, songwriter and actor
Jeremy Narby (1959) Canadian anthropologist
Source: The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge
“By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man's, I mean.”
Mark Twain book Following the Equator
Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar, Ch. XXXIX
Following the Equator (1897)
“Just when I thought I was learning how to live, 'twas then I realized I was learning how to die.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist
“The master is not the one who teaches; it's the one who suddenly learns.”
João Guimarães Rosa (1908–1967) Brazilian novelist
Source: Grande Sertao: Veredas
Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister
Book V, Chapter 1.
Books, Coningsby (1844), Vivian Grey (1826)
“I have learned a great deal from novels. Some of it is even true.”
Dean Koontz (1945) American author
“We must learn how to explode! Any disease is healthier than the one provoked by a hoarded rage.”
Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist
“All I have learned, I learned from books.”
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States
Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) Mexican painter
Variant: I drank because I wanted to drown my sorrows. But now the damned things have learned to swim, and now decency and good behavior weary me.
David Lynch (1946) American filmmaker, television director, visual artist, musician and occasional actor
“Chaos is rejecting all you have learned. Chaos is being yourself.”
Emil M. Cioran book A Short History of Decay
Source: A Short History of Decay (1949)
Francesco Petrarca (1304–1374) Italian scholar and poet
As quoted in "Lifetime Speaker's Encyclopedia" (1962) by Jacob Morton Braude, p. 75
W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) Irish poet and playwright
St. 5 <br class="br">Michael Robartes and the Dancer (1921), A Prayer For My Daughter http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/1421/ <br class="br">Source: The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats <br class="br">Context: In courtesy I’d have her chiefly learned;<br>Hearts are not had as a gift but hearts are earned<br>By those that are not entirely beautiful;<br>Yet many, that have played the fool<br>For beauty’s very self, has charm made wise.<br>And many a poor man that has roved,<br>Loved and thought himself beloved,<br>From a glad kindness cannot take his eyes.
“Learning softeneth the heart and breedeth gentleness and charity.”
Mark Twain book The Prince and the Pauper
Source: The Prince and the Pauper
“I learned a long time ago:bet against Annabeth.”
Rick Riordan The Mark of Athena
Source: The Mark of Athena
“Who does not understand should either learn, or be silent.”
John Dee (1527–1608) English mathematican, astrologer and antiquary
Source: The Hieroglyphic Monad
“You can learn a lot about a woman by getting smashed with her.”
Tom Waits (1949) American singer-songwriter and actor
“It is right to learn even from an enemy.”
Fas est et ab hoste doceri.
Book IV, 428
Variant translations:
It is right to learn, even from the enemy.
Right it is to be taught even by the enemy.
It is right to be taught even by an enemy.
We can learn even from our enemies.
Metamorphoses (Transformations)
“The more I learn about people, the more I like my dog.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist
“Education, I fear, is learning to see one thing by going blind to another.”
Aldo Leopold book A Sand County Almanac
Source: A Sand County Almanac, 1949, Manitoba: Clandeboye, p. 168.
Source: A Sand County Almanac and Sketches Here and There
“If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you, and you'll never learn.”
Ray Bradbury book Fahrenheit 451
Source: Fahrenheit 451 (1953)
“Love, too, has to be learned.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist
Source: The Gay Science
Anthony Bourdain book Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook
Medium Raw (2010)
Source: Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook
“The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.”
Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895) English biologist and comparative anatomist
On the advisableness of improving natural knowledge (1866) http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext01/thx1410.txt <br class="br">1860s <br class="br">Source: Collected Essays of Thomas Henry Huxley <br class="br">Context: The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin. And it cannot be otherwise, for every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority, the cherishing of the keenest scepticism, the annihilation of the spirit of blind faith; and the most ardent votary of science holds his firmest convictions, not because the men he most venerates hold them; not because their verity is testified by portents and wonders; but because his experience teaches him that whenever he chooses to bring these convictions into contact with their primary source, Nature — whenever he thinks fit to test them by appealing to experiment and to observation — Nature will confirm them. The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English poet, literary critic and philosopher
18 December 1831
Table Talk (1821–1834)
“intelligence is intuitive
you needn't learn to love
unless you've been taught
to fear and hate”
Saul Williams (1972) American singer, musician, poet, writer, and actor
Source: , said the shotgun to the head.
Michael J. Fox (1961) Canadian-American actor
Source: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Future...: Twists and Turns and Lessons Learned
“I usually learn more from the situations I hate than the ones I love.”
Wally Lamb book She's Come Undone
Source: She's Come Undone
Booker T. Washington (1856–1915) African-American educator, author, orator, and advisor
Variant: Success is not measured by the position one has reached in life, rather by the obstacles one overcomes while trying to succeed
Source: 1900s, Up From Slavery (1901), Chapter II: Boyhood Days
Source: Up From Slavery: An Autobiography
Context: I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed. Looked at from this standpoint, I almost reached the conclusion that often the Negro boy's birth and connection with an unpopular race is an advantage, so far as real life is concerned. With few exceptions, the Negro youth must work harder and must perform his tasks even better than a white youth in order to secure recognition. But out of the hard and unusual struggle through which he is compelled to pass, he gets a strength, a confidence, that one misses whose pathway is comparatively smooth by reason of birth and race.
Aldo Leopold book A Sand County Almanac
“April: Sky Dance”, p. 32-33.
A Sand County Almanac, 1949, "April: Come High Water," "April: Draba," "April: Bur Oak," & "April:Sky Dance"
Source: A Sand County Almanac and Sketches Here and There
“Learn as if you were not reaching your goal and as though you were scared of missing it”
Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher
Haruki Murakami book What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
Source: What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
Tad Williams (1957) novelist
Source: Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn, The Dragonbone Chair (1988), Chapter 42, “Beneath the Uduntree” (p. 718).
Context: “Never make your home in a place,” the old man had said, too lazy in the spring warmth to do more than wag a finger. “Make a home for yourself inside your own head. You’ll find what you need to furnish it—memory, friends you can trust, love of learning, and other such things.” Morgenes had grinned. “That way it will go with you wherever you journey. You’ll never lack for a home—unless you lose your head, of course...”
No. 96 (16 February 1751)
Source: The Rambler (1750–1752)
“I thought I was learning to live; I was only learning to die.”
Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath
The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci (1938), I Philosophy
Variant: While I thought I have been learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.
“I've learned…. That opportunities are never lost; someone will take the ones you miss.”
Andy Rooney (1919–2011) writer, humorist, television personality
“I think that somehow, we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.”
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States
As quoted in Peter's Quotations : Ideas for Our Time (1972) by Laurence J. Peter, p. 5
“I learned to walk as a baby and I haven't had a lesson since.”
Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer
“Whoever wishes to become a philosopher must learn not to be frightened by absurdities.”
Bertrand Russell The Problems of Philosophy
Source: The Problems of Philosophy
Neale Donald Walsch (1943) American writer
Source: Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue, Book 1
“That's the thing about lessons, you always learn them when you don't expect them or want them.”
Cecelia Ahern book If You Could See Me Now
Source: If You Could See Me Now